


It's Not Tonight, That I'm Set Alight

by DelilahMidnight



Category: Fire (1996)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-15 06:28:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29059779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DelilahMidnight/pseuds/DelilahMidnight
Summary: "With the roar of the fire, my heart rose to its feetLike the ashes of ash, I saw rise in the heatSettled soft and as pure as snowI fell in love with the fire long ago"
Relationships: Radha/Sita
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	It's Not Tonight, That I'm Set Alight

Radha’s lips burn.

They have been since the minute Sita set the spark with her mouth, her violet lips an ember in the dimly lit bedroom.

Radha stares into the mirror above the sink, her fingers tugging the delicate skin of her lips, heedless of the running water—Ashok would rebuke her—marveling at how normal they look, how common: their normal shade of earthy pink, not red, not blistered, not cracked or peeling—no sign at all of what Sita had done to her. What Radha could feel in her, spreading from her mouth to the spaces between her ribs and the small of her back. Her blood courses through her with a heat that leaves her weak, the hair on the back of her neck plastered with sweat. She puts her hands into the stream of water and splashes some on her face, over her hair and behind her ears. When she turns over her shaking hands to look at her palms, she can’t believe they aren’t glowing bright red, wanting.

Sita is not apologetic. It’s not in her nature, especially when she doesn’t think she's in the wrong. But she smiles more gently, less boldly, when she asks Radha to oil her hair, and her touch lingers on Radha’s palm when she passes her the bottle.

Radha avoids looking at Sita, but she can feel her smiling in the mirror. When she tilts her head to the side to give Radha access to the tense muscle behind her ear, she deliberately brushes the opposite cheek against Radha’s retreating wrist, and Radha can’t stop the smallest sound from escaping—less than a sound, more like a snatch of breath—but Sita grins when their eyes meet in the mirror, open and warm. Radha swallows, sinks her fingers deeper under Sita’s jet-black hair, feels the shudder that spirals from Sita’s temples down her shoulders, as if she’s cold suddenly, as if Radha’s fingertips aren’t dragging sparks across her scalp.

Sita sits enraptured by Radha’s story, watching every motion of her long-fingered hands with a hunger she doesn’t realize is written plainly on her face. She’s pretending to play at cards, but in reality she’s engrossed in the tragic tale of the abandoned queen, finding it hard to look away from Radha’s smooth features, the glint of bangles on her wrist. The way Radha speaks—the elegance in her low voice, so level and calm, no matter how absurd or cruel her story becomes...Sita can see her as the queen herself, her clear brow adorned with an enormous gold maang teika, her golden veil half concealing her lovely face.

“I guess the queen just couldn’t leave her husband...could she?” Sita asks, genuinely curious. Radha doesn’t respond; it’s Mundu, squatting on her other side, who opens his mouth first. But Radha’s head tilts to the side, a curious smile on her face. Her eyes are half in shadow, but they glitter. She doesn’t look away from Sita until Mundu says the words “you’re married”, and then, whatever Sita thought she saw behind her eyes is shuttered once more.

Radha guides Sita through the rituals of the night, first showing her the moon through the chalni, then instructing her on which offerings to toss for the moon. The whole time she is acutely aware of the heat of her, standing so close behind her on such a warm night. Her dupatta slips from her head and its Sita’s delicate fingers that draw it up the back of her head and down her shoulder again. Radha closes her eyes and tries to focus on the hunger pangs that have been plaguing her all day; but her body seems to have reached the point where it has given up calling for relief. Instead she feels a pull towards the woman standing behind her, the way the flames of two diyas facing each other will waver back and forth before joining. She’s weak, she’s dizzy from hunger; she tells herself she simply needs to rest as sweat drips down her temple and she wipes her upper lip with the edge of her thumb. When Sita makes a joke (but no one’s laughing) about Ashok and Swamiji, Radha turns to her sharply and tells her the same thing. And then Sita asks for water.

Radha knows exactly what she’s doing when she hands Ashok’s glass to Sita. She watches the realization, the pleasure of it, blaze in Sita’s face before she drains the glass. When she hands it back, it’s scalding, as if filled with fresh chai, but only for a moment, and Radha doesn’t lose her grip.

She feels the heat of her, first. Actually, she dreams she’s feverish, burning hot and cold wildly back and forth, and Ashok ignores her while bathing Swamiji in rosewater poured from a silver vessel. She dreams she reaches for the jug, and tries to drink, to pour it over her overheated scalp, but she radiates so much heat that the water turns to steam as it hits her crown, and her eyes see nothing but clouds of smoke. She will burn here, alive.

And then, suddenly, she’s awake, and Sita is leaning over her, her hair a dark curtain smelling of incense and amla, and she tries to sit up and mumble a protest, but Sita pushes her down, gently, her hands soft and ardent as she pulls Radha’s hair back behind her ear. Radha closes her eyes, presses her cheek into the pillow, ready to deny her one last time, if Sita wants to take an out—but then her lips are tracing the curve of Radha’s neck, sweet as a funeral pyre and twice as needy, up to her earlobe, and she whispers, “You’ve ignited me.”

Her voice is so raw that Radha unfurls for her, turns over so her chest is bared to her—Sita takes her face in her hands and drinks from her lips, as greedy as when she drank from her brother-in-law’s cup. When they come apart to breathe, Radha kisses Sita’s hand, completely ablaze and now unable to extinguish it, this feeling, this need, whatever it is Sita has done to her—she looks at her and can’t understand how the flames aren’t reflected back in Sita’s eyes. Sita must see the fear in hers though, because she pulls her closer, guiding Radha to turn over towards her, and Radha goes for her neck, the easiest place to hide—Sita sighs when Radha’s lips brush her skin, lets out a sound she’s never heard before when Radha unconsciously shifts her leg into the parting of her thighs, and suddenly Radha wants to be engulfed in her, wants Sita to be the only thing she can see or hear, smell or feel—or taste—

She opens her mouth onto the dark skin of her collarbone, and Sita says her name, so sweetly Radha feels something move within her, as if it was responding, just now, for the first time, to her name in that tone of voice. Her fingers move up to cradle the back of Sita’s head, to give her a better position from where she can kiss every inch of skin bared under the rumpled pull of Sita’s dark green kurta. Sita is breathing hard, as if she’s trying to control herself but failing, and every exhale is making Radha’s belly tighten like it’s waiting for something, something _more_ but she’s not sure what more means, what’s more than this—

Sita’s hands are on her shoulders like vices and she pulls her up, almost urgently, and when Radha’s facing her again Sita kisses her, slowly and with such relish that Radha tries to copy what she’s doing with her mouth. Distracted, she doesn’t notice the absence of Sita’s hands until she gathers her breasts and rubs her thumbs over them, and Radha shudders into a groan, her hips rocking uncontrollably in a motion that makes her ashamed, until Sita reaches down and pulls her leg higher, tucking it around her waist like she knows what she’s doing. Like that, one hand pulling her thigh up and one hand massaging her breast, Sita kisses her and rolls her hips once, twice, three times, until Radha gasps and shakes and feels liquid heat tightening and unspooling down the insides of her legs. The realization of what’s happening only makes the feeling more intense, and she only has time and sense enough to choke out Sita’s name before she’s rigid and clutching Sita’s shoulders as wave after wave of heat passes through her.

Sita is moving against her softly, her mouth on Radha’s exposed neck, and when Radha’s heart has stopped its frantic gallop and she’s breathing almost normally again, Sita pulls back to search her face. “Is this okay?” she whispers, and she looks almost as terrified as Radha feels. In response, Radha turns them over, so she’s kneeling over Sita flat on her back. She ghosts the backs of her fingertips over Sita’s cheek, and Sita closes her eyes, turns her face in to the touch. Radha thinks she’s never seen this look on her face for Jatin—certainly she’s never felt anything similar herself for Ashok in the last ten years. It’s a strange thing, a tiny flame that burns here in the dark between them, one only they can see.

Radha won’t let it burn them. Either of them. She won’t let this flame go out.


End file.
